Interviews Victoria Chang’s new collection, Dear Memory, expands the field of the memoir for readers to explore a full-color archive of family photos and historical documents collaged between lines of poetry and letters. It prompts us to ask, with her, What composes a life and what makes of life art? What makes of memory history, and whose history, and how do we survive loss? We might expect the author of five books of poetry and two children’s books to incorporate the lyric in her first book of nonfiction, but Chang goes further. If her memories arrive at times as poetry, she denies them the protection of a poem. For instance, at the end of a letter that begins, “Do you remember those Fridays in gym class . . . ,” she realizes that memory may be “the exit wound of joy.” Such insights pierce us before we can register surprise. Elsewhere, she covers her mother’s mouth with three Mandarin characters in the photo on her certificate of naturalization, inserting her reservation into the official record along with her daughter’s grief. I reached out to Chang, moved by this book’s innovative form. “It was always my goal as a writer to be able to make whatever I want,” she told me via Zoom video hosted by the low-residency MFA program at Antioch University, which she directs. The winner of a Guggenheim Fellowship, the Los Angeles Times Book Prize, the Anisfield-Wolf Book Award, the PEN Voelcker Award, a Sustainable Arts Foundation... Continue reading at 'World Literature Today'
[ World Literature Today | 2022-01-05 19:50:39 UTC ]
Rich Benjamin’s new book Talk to Me explores the coup that overthrew his grandfather, the president of Haiti, in 1957. Continue reading at Slate
[ Slate | 2025-02-15 10:00:00 UTC ]
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A big-name picture book adaptation of the Grimm fairy tale “Hansel and Gretel” goes to HarperCollins, Margaret Atwood brings a memoir to Doubleday, Sourcebooks picks up the memoir of the daughter of Gisele Pelicot, and more in this week’s book deals. Continue reading at Publishers Weekly
[ Publishers Weekly | 2025-02-14 05:00:00 UTC ]
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The multi-award winning feminist author Margaret Atwood (The Handmaid’s Tale) has announced that she will be releasing her long-awaited memoir ... Continue reading at Book Riot
[ Book Riot | 2025-02-12 19:59:13 UTC ]
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“I am determined to keep writing, it has never mattered to me more.” Hanif Kureishi on trauma, recovery and what it means to be a writer. | Lit Hub Memoir Just in time for Valentine’s Day: 25 writers explain the anatomy of a good sex scene. | Lit Hub Craft Pankaj Mishra on nationalism,... Continue reading at Literrary Hub
[ Literrary Hub | 2025-02-11 11:30:21 UTC ]
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The Lit Hub Author Questionnaire is a monthly interview featuring seven questions for five authors with new books. This month we talk to: * Justin Haynes (Ibis) Shane McCrae (New and Collected Hell: A Poem) Haley Mlotek (No Fault: A Memoir of Romance and Divorce) Maggie Su (Blob: A Love Story)... Continue reading at Literrary Hub
[ Literrary Hub | 2025-02-11 09:57:52 UTC ]
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This story about a child with cerebral palsy is badly misleading – and a slap in the face for families like oursAmazing news from Netflix: there is an extraordinary treatment available for children with very severe neurological disabilities, one that, given the appropriate level of parental... Continue reading at The Guardian
[ The Guardian | 2025-02-11 08:00:11 UTC ]
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I’ve known Lauren Markham’s writing since her first book, The Faraway Brothers, came out in 2017. Then, a couple years ago, I got to know her a bit more as a person when a friend emailed the two of us and another writer to ask our thoughts on writing (and teaching) journalism versus memoir or […] Continue reading at Literrary Hub
[ Literrary Hub | 2025-02-07 09:57:40 UTC ]
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In Sarah Chihaya’s memoir Bibliophobia, we enter into the moment of her breakdown—an event that she has seen on her horizon since childhood, but also seemed impossibly remote. As a child of Japanese and Japanese-Canadian immigrants to the US, Chihaya’s parents “didn’t really believe in the... Continue reading at Literrary Hub
[ Literrary Hub | 2025-02-06 09:56:18 UTC ]
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Sarah Chihaya’s unconventional memoir charts her troubled relationship with the literature that formed her. Continue reading at The Atlantic
[ The Atlantic | 2025-01-31 13:00:00 UTC ]
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Edmund White’s The Loves of My Life, Dorian Lynsky’s Everything Must Go, and Liz Pelly’s Mood Machine all feature among the best reviewed nonfiction titles of the month. Brought to you by Book Marks, Lit Hub’s home for book reviews. * 1. The Loves of My Life: A Sex Memoir by Edmund White... Continue reading at Literrary Hub
[ Literrary Hub | 2025-01-31 09:58:15 UTC ]
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This searing memoir recounts one woman's epic journey to trace the global slave trade across the Atlantic Ocean—and find her ... Continue reading at Book Riot
[ Book Riot | 2025-01-30 12:00:00 UTC ]
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A new memoir by the tech mogul recounts a boyhood steeped in old-fashioned, analog pastimes as well as precocious feats of coding. Continue reading at The New York Times
[ The New York Times | 2025-01-30 10:05:04 UTC ]
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It’s among the more playful matters on his mind in “Shattered,” a memoir of the injury that took away his ability to turn pages — but not his hunger to tell a story. Continue reading at The New York Times
[ The New York Times | 2025-01-30 10:00:13 UTC ]
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At 84, Edmund White is ready to kiss (to put it mildly) and tell ... well, everything. Continue reading at Slate
[ Slate | 2025-01-28 16:56:52 UTC ]
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By the time I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings hit shelves in the first days of 1970, buzz about the memoir had been building for some time. Newspaper stories about its author, Maya Angelou—a well-known dancer, singer, and political activist—had been teasing the book for years; both Ebony and... Continue reading at Literrary Hub
[ Literrary Hub | 2025-01-28 09:57:54 UTC ]
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A cozy fantasy bodyguard romance, a darkly funny memoir exploring the toll of sexism, a new detective duo, and more of today's best book deals Continue reading at Book Riot
[ Book Riot | 2025-01-23 17:04:23 UTC ]
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Activist, Spy, and Icon Josephine Baker's memoir, a bookish memoir about mental illness and identity by a literature professor, and more. Continue reading at Book Riot
[ Book Riot | 2025-01-21 13:30:00 UTC ]
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